Daniel 10:1

In the third year of Cyrus king of Persia, a thing is revealed to Daniel, whose name is called Belteshazzar, and the thing is true, and the warfare is great: and he hath understood the thing, and hath understanding about the appearance.

Daniel 10 is about that warfare–the struggle and conflict of Daniel. What he was shown was hard to bear, trying and overwhelming. And searching out the why–the understanding of the thing–was difficult.

The thing is also true: truth is not always pleasant. How much has this man suffered, not only at the hands of pagan kings, but because of the things he has sought God about and subsequently learned.

And yet the point is to strengthen him. He has been shown something of the horrors of Antiochus IV. He has seen that there is a worse beast after the Greeks–a beast calamitous. He knows that desolations shall flood Jerusalem, the city holy to him. And all this comes because he is greatly beloved.

Daniel knows God’s favor, but it does not lead him along a broad and easy way. It leads him through anguish not even his companions in fasting are put through. It leads him to an overwhelming vision of Our Lord as he later appears to the Apostle John.

Daniel has a terrible vision of Christ so debilitating he cannot even stand; and yet it is the words of Christ in that vision that strengthen Daniel. Why did Daniel undergo so much? The weak must be strengthened. It was because he was singled out for privilege far beyond his first capacities. This, after all, is the pattern of the life of the sons of God.